​Can a water drop objects make objects appear bigger or smaller?

​For centuries, people have been looking for ways to see objects in greater detail. How can something as a drop of water make this possible?

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​Aralinks: Water Drop Magnifier

​The surface of a water drop curves outward to make a dome. This outward, or convex, curvature bends light rays inward. The result is an enlarged image on the retina of your eye. This mechanisms is similar to LENSES.

​Microscope

from the Latin microscopium means an "instrument for viewing what is small​"

​Development of Microscopes

​It’s not clear who invented the first microscope, but the Dutch spectacle maker Hans and Zacharias Janssen (b.1585) is credited with making one of the earliest compound microscopes (ones that used two lenses) around 1600. The earliest microscopes could magnify an object up to 20 or 30 times its normal size.

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​In the late 1600s the Dutch merchant Anton van Leeuwenhoek made improvements to the first microscope. This microscope had one lens and could magnify an image about 270 times to its original size.

​Types of Microscopes

​One characteristic of all microscopes is that they magnify (makes objects appear larger than it really is)objects. They also have resolution (how clearly the magnified object can be seen).

​Light Microscope

use light and lenses to enlarge an image of an object​

1. ​a simple light microscope has only one lens.

2. ​a compound microscope make use of more than one lens.

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​A compound microscope magnifies an image first by one lens (objective lens). The image is then further magnified by another lens, called the ocular lens. The total magnification of the ocular lens and objective lens multiplied together.

​Matter is made up of atoms. Inside the atoms are electrons.

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Electron microscopes use a magnetic field to focus a beam of electrons through an object or onto an object's surface.

​Two types:

1. ​Transmission Electron Microscope (TEMs)

2. ​Scanning Electron Microscope (SEMs)

​Electron Microscope

​Scanning Electron Microscope

​Now let's get more acquainted with how a compound microscope works.

1. ​Click Explore: Virtual Microscope (Interactive)

2. Read and follow ​PROCEDURE 1: Introduction to the Microscope and its Parts

3. ​Answer the following activities: (1) Lab 1:Introduction to the MICROSCOPE and Its Parts; (2) Lab 1:Introduction to the MICROSCOPE and Its Parts (Part 2)